


I Put The Poli In Your Apol- no wait

by SrtaTropicalia



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Trials of Apollo - Rick Riordan
Genre: Apollo (Percy Jackson) is a Good Parent, Attempt at Humor, Gen, How Do I Tag, Post-Canon, Post-The Tower of Nero (Trials of Apollo), The Tower of Nero (Trials of Apollo) Spoilers, or tries to
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-08
Updated: 2020-12-08
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:01:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27958073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SrtaTropicalia/pseuds/SrtaTropicalia
Summary: In his defense, Apollo was indeed trying his best to be a good father to his children.The sigh Chiron let out should have been warning enough. A boy could not evoke this deep of a sigh on him without it being at least a little bit concerning.Really, Apollo should have seen the red flags.But he didn’t.Edit: Changed the entire last half of the fic bc I just didn't really love it before
Comments: 9
Kudos: 62





	I Put The Poli In Your Apol- no wait

**Author's Note:**

> I was earning for some Apollo Centric Stuff after reading ToN, so I decided to do my take on it.
> 
> This is my first fanfic posted and English is not my first language. So like... please be kind?
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

In his defense, Apollo _was_ indeed trying his best to be a good father to his children.

The thing is, when you have as much children as Apollo had, it was nearly impossible to keep up. Even when you were a god. Because, of course, you have infinite time to do whatever. But your kids? Your kids are mortal. They are stitched close to the flux of time and there are birthdays, Christmas, and graduation, and thanksgiving, and graduation again! and suddenly there is a wedding when you didn’t even know that there was an engagement party. And then there’s a world pandemic, so you kinda _have_ _to_ work, because that’s kinda of your thing.

So, yeah. Apollo tried.

He didn’t like to compare himself to the other Olympians (because, heck, _that_ was a low bar) but the only other God that had beat him to this was like, Hades. And, ok, the pandemic was kind of his jurisdiction too. But, come on! He only had Nico to worry about. Try having twenty plus and counting.

So, yeah. Hyppolite Jones.

One day, Apollo arrived at Camp Half-Blood only to hear that one of his spawn had burn the strawberry fields to ashes. Like, with gasoline. And a match. Multiple matches.

Immediately, Apollo was in denial. No, thanks, sir. His children did not do that shit. They like, healed and stuff. Or glowed. Shit. Oh, shit. The Sun Chariot also burned stuff when it got close enough. Or when some mortals messed up, like with global warming and fires in California and shit. Oh, shit, did Apollo just create a little pyromaniac child? Did he just bless his child with pyromania? Wasn’t that a Hephaestus thing? Could he do that too? Why the heck he didn’t know the extent to his children’s powers?

That never-ending doubt circled through his head, stuck in the back of his mind whether he was correcting anti-vaxers on Facebook or feeding his horses. However, when, in the subsequent week, Apollo received the news that the same child had managed to let all the Pegasi scape from the stables while having a vegan barbecue, the sun god finally understood. No, he hadn’t created a little pyromaniac child. He had created an idiot.

*

So Apollo began asking around.

Nico seemed to not have enough patience even to think about the kid.

From Will, the only thing Apollo got was a confusing rant about açai and its non-existent healing capabilities.

Austin said that Hyppolite had almost taken away, tortured and killed his joy of music.

Kayla recommended earmuffs. And to aim for the head. Do not hesitate, aim for the head.

Cecil disagreed. He said that if you just ignored him, eventually he would leave you alone. Kayla argued that Cecil didn’t have to share a Cabin with him, and Cecil conceded.

Yan tried to say something nice. Focus on ‘tried’.

Elena said that he was kind and funny, but Jerry shouted in the distance that Elena had a crush and, on top of that, had awful taste in men. She did not disagree.

*

Maybe, a hundred years from now, Apollo would tell this story for the millionth time in a Olympian Solstice meeting and he would say: “And then, I dropped everything and went right away to Camp Half-Blood to check on this chaotic (but probably fabulous) spawn of mine.”

That was not _exactly_ what happened.

Because one week became another, and then the summer ended and, oh well. Hyppolite was not a year rounder, apparently.

“Thank the gods he’s not,” said Chiron when asked and, hey. Apollo _did_ ask for Hyppolite. He was still an ok parent.

“He’s that bad?” inquired Apollo further. But then he backtracked: “I mean… I heard some things.” Nice recover, ten out of ten, do not be mean to a son you didn’t even meet. Even though he burned the Strawberry Fields. And, apparently, one of the Pegasi he let scape destroyed the roof of the Hermes Cabin. Oh, well.

The sigh Chiron let out should have been warning enough to make Apollo indeed drop everything and go straight away to check on this chaotic spawn of his. Chiron had been a teacher for millennia, and the Camp was just full of the top tier problematic TM kids of the country, if not the world. The stuff the Stoll’s did reached even Olympus! A boy could not evoke this deep of a sigh on him without it being at least a little bit concerning.

Really, Apollo should have seen the red flags.

But he didn’t.

And life just continued on.

He took Kayla, Austin and Will (and Nico, of course Nico) to some sort of enlightenment camping trip or other. And then he became busy helping Meg, teaching her piano, trying to help her and her adopted siblings to adapt, arranging documents and schooling for said siblings. So, when he least expected it, summer came again (which was a little bit strange, because, as far as he was concerned (and he would know, he was the sun god), summer was at the same time every year). And only _then_ he went to see what all this fuss was about with Hyppolite.

*

Apollo was walking around Camp, using Lester’s face ( _his_ face), carrying a quiver of arrows and trying to find his way back to the campfire while in the strawberry fields. If gossip was to be believed, everything in the Fields was regrown in a span of a day by a single son of Persephone. Apollo did not believe the gossip, but there were the fields.

The setting sun made the nature around him glow in a bronze shade, the golden hour covering the forest with it’s specs of light. Lifting his head to the sun, Apollo stared straight into the light, his skin warm as if it was recharging, like a glow-in-the-dark toy. Maybe that was the way that Will’s glowing powers worked? Apollo really needed to see if there was an Encyclopedia of Demigod’s Powers and Limitations, full of ‘How To’s and ‘What The Heck’s. After Hyppolite, it was one time too many to be confused by his children (possible) power set.

But, yeah, lost in the Strawberry Fields. Or “lost” in the Strawberry Fields. Just a year and a half prior to this, having a so mundane mortal problem like this would infuriate him. Just a _year_ prior to this, being lost while not having a lot of time to complete the next step in his mission would infuriate him. But not now. Now, having such a normal problem like that, a problem that he could fix in seconds but just chose not to, was tranquilizing. It was kinda fun, actually. Kinda _human_.

However, when Apollo heard the bad guitar strumming, he had to keep himself from literally _evaporating_ _the heck out of there_ because, Gods, a guitar did gentler sounds while being wrecked by Damien White. Nonetheless, Apollo persisted. Hearing those kinds of sounds coming from an instrument should provoke physical pain in the God of Music (and, trust him, it did) but he didn’t turn around and run screaming for mercy. No, Apollo did the brave thing: he summoned his trusted combat ukulele and went straight ahead to bash the head of the responsible of doing such a vile act to a guitar.

To follow the sound was easy enough: just go to the place all the dryads were running from. Apparently, the sound was bad enough to make the nymphs not really mind if they were going close to Apollo, at least they could run away from the sound.

And so, the God entered the woods, ukulele in hands, quiver on his back and a strong resolve to _just make it stop._

The song (could it be _even_ called a song?) just got louder and louder. And, then, Apollo stumbled upon a clearing and saw… Ok, what even was this?

In the middle of the grass, a young boy did with curly brown hair and a Camp shirt did strange gestures, his arms stretched in front of his body while his pelvis just went up and down, hitting the sides of his hands. By his side, a young nymph observed the boy, trying to imitate his gestures with a focused expression.

Using the visual clues (the overjoyed expression, the laughter, the hipbone going up and down in sync with the guitar strumming) Apollo guessed it was some kind of a dance. And, then, he gave himself a pat in the back for his outstanding logic skills, because that thing did not look like a valid dance move in the slightest. Well, at least they were having fun. The camper and the Nymph were exchanging glances and, oh, that was sweet, Apollo guessed.

Whatever, he was not the God of Dancing. Maybe. Was he now? Apollo was, indeed, close with the muses. If he wasn’t, then who was? Wasn’t Terpsichore, like, a minor God? She was the God of Dance. But then did this mean that there was multiple Gods of Poetry? Well, this was exhausting. Let’s just put it in a box and leave it there for the next century. Some things not even the Gods knew about. Like this Dance Thing Apollo was experiencing in front of his eyes right now.

However, what Apollo in fact was, was the God of Music. And damn, what _was_ this music.

There was a kid next to the two dancers(?), seated in a big rock and with a guitar on his hands. It wasn’t like the kid wouldn’t know rhythm if it punched him in the face. But that was exactly it. If Apollo analyzed the details, he could kind of comprehend what went wrong. The kid (sun kissed light skin, straight brown hair tied in a low ponytail, wearing ugly shorts covered in magenta poppies) played the basic pop song chords, without the capo and with the loosest grip Apollo had ever seen in a hand.

If the God could select his own set of Seven Deadly and Unforgivable Sins, he was sure this scene before his eyes would contain all of them.

“What the heck.”

He must’ve said it out loud, because the music stopped. Thank the Gods. And all the eyes in the clearing were turned to him, which, not really awesome, but at least the guitar guy stopped playing.

But then the guitar guy started talking:

“Heeey!” guitar guy (because Apollo refuses to call this heathen a Guitarist) waves at him, “Do you wanna join? Dan here is teaching Hope how to dance!” Oh, so that _was indeed_ dancing that they were doing.

The guy, Dan, just opened a big smile and waved Apollo’s way.

“Uh…” Apollo took a few tentative steps towards the strange group. “What are you guys doing?”

“A ritual.”

A pause.

Apollo waited for the laughter. He had learned, from experience, not to laugh at other people’s religion. He has already met the Norse. And some cult people. So, in situations like these, he’s better safe than sorry. And, when the kids stay all serious and stuff, he’s glad he did that. It’s not good to mock children, after all. But like.

He is pretty sure he knows all religion that has ever existed in the world. And that’s not it, fam. And like, he’s not the type of deity that goes all “Thou shall have no other gods before me”. But like. Holy shit.

And that’s what he says.

“Holy shit.”

Guitar Guy doesn’t seem to mind.

“You new right? My name is Poli, and this is my friend Dan,” Poli says, not mentioning the nymph because, by now, she had already run away from them, most likely having recognized Apollo. “So like, you’ll join us or not?”

“We were just starting on the offerings!” Dan adds, gesturing to a basket of strawberries.

“… What’s your intent with this?” Apollo would like to not meet Satan today, thank you very much. Not that he has anything against the guy, but… He has heard stories, ok?

“Just a light summon ritual,” Poli replies.

“And you think is gonna work?”

“Well, you appeared, didn’t you? What’s one more?”

Apollo has to agree.

So, there’s him. Circling a campfire, throwing strawberries at it and refusing to do the moves that Dan teaches him. Because, well, while he supposed that helping two children to do a summoning ritual it’s not the worst way that he thought this afternoon could go, Apollo refuses to do this kind of nonsense dance.

He takes some more strawberries. And, in the slight pause between two truly awful songs, Apollo decides do ask:

“So, do you have specifics in who to summon?”

Not Satan. Not Satan. Not Satan.

“My dad.”

And. Ouch. That’s awful. Objectively, Apollo knows that only one or two people at camp don’t have mommy and daddy issues, and that’s just because they were adopted early in life by mortal parents. But, every time that Apollo hears a demigod talk about this, he’s baffled. Because it sucks. And it’s a whole, entire summer camp ( _two_ summer camps… and his sister’s Hunters… and…) that’s full of problems because gods truly suck and are, by now, so removed from normal, mortal life, that they can’t even attend their children’s birthday without it being weird.

Except like, for Hades. But Hades doesn’t count, as previously stablished.

“And who’s your dad again?” Apollo intents to have a little talk with them. Really.

“It’s not obvious?” Poli says, as he throws his hair back and strikes a pose with his guitar.

Sincerely, Apollo didn’t know that lack of a musical talent could be hereditary, but if one could do it, of course it would be Ares. Sincerely, Apollo still did not recover from that Karaoke over a thousand years ago. Maybe, for a child of Ares, play guitar that awfully _could_ be seen as a gift. Well, his son Will also has that terrible whistle, capable of stopping armed troops, according to gossip. Maybe _he’ll_ have to ask Ares about passing down powers to demigods, as, Apollos sees, the war god just created a pretty powerful creature right here. Maybe Ares knows how to stop powers from passing down too. So that Apollo will not create more flaming idiots like that son of his, Hyppolite.

Also.

They were indeed trying to summon Satan, then. Heck.

But Apollo just goes back to throwing strawberries at the fire, because that’s the least he can do to the poor kid.

In between circles, the gods tries to see if Dan doesn’t want for his parent to appear too.

“Nah. Like, Persephone’s cool. She visits me and my mom, other mom, mortal mom, sometimes.”

And like, ok, maybe Apollo will have to put Persephone next to Hades on the S tier of “Good Greek God Parents”.

They dance again.

And Apollo is just losing his mind, because?? Does this never end???

He’s just giving it up and dragging Ares down here himself all the way from Olympus, when he tries to keep conversation for one more time.

“So, there’s any method for your…” he keeps himself from saying ‘madness’, because Poli can _not_ be more than 13 years old and not one demigod deserves to be called names after having so much bullshit thrown at them just for being born.

“So glad you asked, my awesome friend!” Poli stops playing. Amen. “So, daddy is always visiting, right?” Ares. Daddy. Urgh. How do you expect Apollo to take that haunting image off his mind now? “And like, the first time I heard he came to visit, me and my bro Dan here had just burned down the Strawberry Fields.”

Dan looks legitimately put down by the mention of this. Poli puts a meaningful hand on his friend’s shoulder.

But wait. What?

“And like, the second time that Will said he had come was when we made that vegan barbecue, right Dan?”

What!?

“And then daddy took everyone a trip, and that was right after I short circuited Camp trying to light a stage for me to perform.” Ok, that one Apollo hadn’t heard about, but he had noticed Camp was kinda dark when he dropped the children back from the trip.

Also, WHAT!?

“So, I tried to put together what made him come all that times…”

“And I helped!” Dan puffed out his chest.

“And Dan helped!” Poli, no _Hyppolite_ grinned. “And what they had on common was like, things catching on fire! And also, Dan dancing and me playing, because we always do that, you know? So, hey, we made a ritual! Genius, right?”

“You’re my son Hyppolite,” Apollo blurted.

Poli blinked. And then looked at his _dad_. And then blinked again.

Really, that moment when, surprise! I’m your dad inhabiting a body of a sixteen-year-old, was reveled could never get less awkward, he swears.

But then it dawns upon Apollo. He _deserves_ it to be awkward. He had left this child to fend for himself. He had never seen this son of his in all thirteen years of his life. Heck, if asked, he would not even know who his mother or father was. Or where he was from. Or even what hecking godly power Apollo had given to him.

“Sorry for not showing up before.” Apollo chocked up.

In a fluid movement, Poli pushed his guitar to his back and opened his arms to embrace his dad.

“Here, here,” Poli said as he patted his back, “Shhhh, it’s ok. Just put it out. I’m here now. Shhhh.”

“I’m so, so, so sorry,” Apollo repeated. “I promise to be more present from now on, I…I…”

“Nah, it’s fine, man. I have a very good Granma and she kinda does it for me on the day to day," Poli reassured, "Just like, you’ve never seen me and it would be nice for you to know I exist, I guess.”

“Oof,” was the only commentary offered by Dan, who was now sitting cross legged on the ground and eating… popcorn? Really? Where did… Did they _plan_ this? Was Poli like 'Hey, my dad will show up and I will have a heart to heart and then you can just, stand by and eat popcorn, I guess?'. Maybe Apollo was overthinking. Maybe was just the surrealistic nature of this specific son of his getting to his mind. But damn, if that was the plan, sure Poli had a thing for the theatrics.

“I knew you existed,” Apollo sniffled, but that was a weak excuse even for him.

Yeah, Apollo knew that Poli existed. Apollo knew and was _scared_ of meeting him, the rumored problem child. The child no one wanted to deal with. Heck, what had he done? Had he not learned that just ignoring his problems would not make then go away? And, shit, at the end of the day all the things Poli did were on him. He had made them happen, because he was a not very good father and failed to give his child the attention he deserved.

The kid waited for Apollo to calm down before ending the hug with a pat on the back and another grin.

And hey.

Maybe Poli wasn’t as bad as people made him seem.

“Well,” Poli swiftly pulled his guitar back, before just _sticking his hand into the hole of his guitar and taking off the hecking Golden Fleece from there_ , “It’s kinda relieving that you dropped by before we put the Golden Fleece down the flames too. Hey, could you give me a magic guitar?”

Ok, Apollo took that back. This son was just an idiot, after all.

**Author's Note:**

> That’s me, randomly censoring swearwords because Percy Jackson is a childre’s series and I don’t really know what’s bad and what’s really bad in english
> 
> I just have so many ideas for Poli. Actually, a lot of the stuff was pulled from an RPG that I did, and there's so much more.
> 
> I feel like maybe Apollo was a little bit lost and ooc and my excuse for that is that is been a long time since I’ve written a character I didn’t create. So, yeah, I feel like I am rusty. Sorry bout that.


End file.
